LAHORE: Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz has approved the Nawaz Sharif Kisan Card.
A special meeting was held on agricultural reforms, chaired by Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz.
The meeting reviewed the bill to stop the use of agricultural land for residential purposes and to restructure the Punjab Seed Corporation and the Punjab Council of Agricultural Research.
During the meeting, Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz gave approval to issue the “Nawaz Sharif Kisan Card”.
In this regard, the Chief Minister said that 500,000 farmers will get loans worth Rs 150 billion annually on easy terms through Kisan Card.
Farmers will get an agricultural loan of Rs 30,000 per acre to buy the best seeds, fertilizers and pesticides.
She said that the government will provide various kinds of subsidies through Nawaz Sharif Kisan Card. She said that model agriculture centers would be set up in collaboration with the private sector across Punjab.
Modern agricultural technology, training, pesticides, seeds and model plots will be created in the model agricultural centers.
She further said that in the first phase, a model agricultural center will be established in each district of the province. These steps will help farmers get rid of fake fertilizers and medicines.
The chief minister directed the agriculture department to collect complete production and demand data for each crop.
The meeting also approved the establishment of a state-of-the-art center of excellence for research and development of cotton, wheat and rice crops.
At the meeting, it was agreed to manage the administrative affairs of the center of excellence through the council and to link the research center with regional universities.
It was also decided that a research and development center would be established at the Faisalabad University of Agriculture with the help of China at a cost of Rs 2 billion.
The Pak-China R&D Center will have research facilities for genome, germplasm resources, breeding acceleration and climate change.
Changes will be made to the Agricultural Pesticides Act and the Fertilizer Control Act to curb the sale of fake agricultural drugs and fertilizers.
At the meeting, it was agreed to equip the agricultural superstructure wing with modern technology and 500 agricultural graduates will be accepted.
